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Twenty-five years ago, just before my graduate show at Goldsmiths College, I destroyed my art and escaped to America. My contemporaries at college [Damien Hirst and Sarah Lucas] were heading for success, but I wanted to develop my work in private.

“All I had when I moved in were a lot of art books and 20 old Macs”

I travelled for a long time with my now ex-wife, Tracy Angel, a radical poet. I’ve just returned to the UK and live on my own in this studio flat in Hastings, East Sussex. It’s in a slightly dishevelled Regency building overlooking the sea.

Untitled painting by Lena Lewis-King, Michelle's teenage daughter. 'She's quite a polymath, she makes films and paints and draws - and is like a step-daughter to me,' says FudgeCredit:
Christopher Pledger

All I had when I moved in were a lot of art books and 20 old Macs. I listen to a lot of Steve Reich as I work. I can easily paint all day.

Objects of interest

Easel I’ve had this easel since college and it’s covered in paint. When I was younger, I was this crazy person who painted a bit wildly. I was into Pollock and Picasso, so I loved the physical energy of being a painter

Postcard from Sarah Lucas Sarah and I wrote to each other a lot while I was away. She’s created a private life for herself so that, despite all her fame, she’s still Sarah

Old Master soaps I painted Rembrandt and Leonardo copies on these soaps at college and took them with me to America. I liked Duchamp’s idea of Le Boîte-en-Valise [a suitcase containing miniature replicas of the artist’s work]

Fudge has drawn replicas of drawings by Old Masters on soapsCredit:
Christopher Pledger

1980s Apple computer I found this computer in a thrift store in Montana. My ex-wife wrote her poems on it while we were travelling. Recently, she told me to destroy them all, but I never could

An Apple computer from the EightiesCredit:
Christopher Pledger

Buddhist monk painting This is on loan from a close friend, the artist Michelle Lewis-King. Damo was a fifth or sixth century Buddhist monk, who taught people how to balance mind and body

Damo paintingCredit:
Christopher Pledger

Nicholas Fudge’s first solo exhibition, Reality Drive, runs at Observer Building, Hastings from Friday (observerbuildinghastings.co.uk). For more details about Nicholas's work, see www.nickfudge.net or email him at info@nicholasfudge.net